Life is the Flower
by aragonite
Summary: A filler chapter for the upcoming book, LEAP YEAR: Test of the Professionals. In all the insanity that is London, men are expected to court their fiancee's on a daily basis and provide the perfect gifts. What can go wrong? Plenty, if your friends have anything to do with it.
1. Chapter 1

**My computer is back! I still can't get to my manuscript until my missing WORD disk shows itself. In the meantime, I'm practicing with some "filler" scenes in this second book. I hope you accept the little bribe!  
**

**Victorian courtship came with so many, many rituals and pitfalls...it was fun to research but thank goodness many of these rules only exist in a watered form today. For those of you who haven't read the stories, Lestrade and Clea Cheatham are being rushed into a marriage and Lestrade has the extra burden of being a good example under the jaded eyes of his many in-laws. Lucky for him he has friends like Bradstreet...or is he?  
**

. . . . . . . . . . .

**Life is the flower for which love is the honey.**

**Victor Hugo **

"Have you been sleeping _at all_?"

This reasonable question was given quite reasonably from the reasonable lips by the most reasonable of men (Roger T. Bradstreet, Bow Street Runner), for the most reasonable of reasons...

...alas that it was targeted to his closest friend.

Closest friends are not elected to the post for being reasonable. They acquire their office by their ability to socialize with you, remain honest about your faults, and still maintain the relationship because for some inexplicable gasp the Newtonian Laws, _they like you anyway._

Geoffrey Lestrade lifted bloodshot eyes from the soothing expanse of paper-work and allowed his heavy head to lower upon the precarious rest of his chin upon the heels of his hands, elbows splayed wide upon the blotting-paper. His arms wobbled, struggling to evenly distribute the weight.

"Why," he asked in a voice not unlike a metal rasp against a plank of virgin pine lumber, "do you ask?"

Bradstreet thus paused, his developing speech quite frozen in the act. The English language is an intricate beast, and a sensitive one with many sore teeth in the areas of spelling, punctuation and grammar. But ask a reasonable question and to be countered with another question that proves the other person missed the sheer obviousness of it all...well it just boggled belief as severely as the coincidences in a Dickens novel.

Behind his shoulder, Bradstreet was aware that Gregson (the rank sod), had perched in his office doorway, hiding in Bradstreet's broad shadow, listening hard for the inevitable delight of an enraged Lestrade.

"Oh, no particular reason, Lestrade." Bradstreet strangled. "The fact that you look like someone tried to stuff you up a chimney again-"

"Again?" Lestrade yelped. "What d'you mean, 'again'?"

"I mean-"

"I have never, _ever _been stuffed up a chimney at all-"

"What I mean to say-"

"No one has even attempted it!"

"That's grand, but-"

"_Ever_!"

"-But-"

_"So what the deuce did you mean by that?"_

"I didn't say you were stuffed up a chimney! Bradstreet roared. "I meant that you _looked _like it!"

"Again." Lestrade prompted in chilling voice.

"Yes."

"When was the first time?" Lestrade continued to use his Scary Voice. It was the same voice that made everyone at the Yard wonder if he'd had a particularly vicious man of the cloth in his childhood.

Bradstreet thought fast. "When we were running the roofs after the lead-thief, and you had to lie flat on your front to lift me off the edge of the gutter."

"Wasn't a gutter." Gregson tutted from behind. "It was a stone gargoyle. German style _wasserspeier_. Shaped like a toothless, giggling demon. Those toffs at Pall Mall know how to put on a roof."

"Gargoyle." Bradstreet corrected hurriedly.

"If that had been a reg'lar building, we'd've been peeling you off the street with that big spatula Morton uses for turning his fishcakes." Gregson snickered.

"Shut y'gob." Bradstreet advised through a chain-link forest of his own clenched teeth.

Lestrade grumbled. "I was over at the railyard if you must know. There was a frightful amount of soot and cinders and not only did we all get caught in it, but half of us wound up breathing in a chestful of steam and smoke." He blinked wearily, which did nothing to improve the fact that the whites of his eyes were now red as currants. The most delicate mist of grey had settled upon his once-pristine white collars and cuffs. Small wonder he was in a fettle. Lestrade would rather be in pain than unprofessional in his appearance.

"The railyard? Browne still the man over there?" Bradstreet folded his arms about his chest with a frown.

"Oh, aye." Lestrade paused and rubbed at the tight knot across his forehead. "He's convinced there's something fishy about the thaw that caused the landslip that wrecked the Hammersmith."

"If Browne thinks so, then I'd trust him." Bradstreet caught Gregson's silent nod in the corner of his eye. Browne was a quiet, cautious man with nerves of frozen steel. He lived, breathed and walked for the plainclothes RPF, and thought of very little else. "So what are you going to do?"

"Can't do anything until he finishes chasing down a few leads." Lestrade grumbled. "In the meantime, I've got to finish up here and get myself home." The hint to allow him this duty was pointed.

Bradstreet grinned at him, and saunted out the office with a polite little clap of the door upon its hasp.

Gregson was rolling his eyes and searching for one of his eternally foul penny cigarettes. They gathered over his teapot by unspoken accord.

"So you're his Best Man." Gregson squinted through a steam of tea.

"That I am." Bradstreet grinned. "Got to make certain he does a good job."

Gregson's squint grew in proportion to cover most of his face. "I see."

Bradstreet faltered. "What's that supposed to mean?"

Gregson was slow in his reply, cautious in his wording, and genrous in his intent. Not at all how he treated Lestrade. "Bradstreet, I was your best man at your wedding because your original man couldn't make it. I'd like to think I did well."

Bradstreet snorted. "Please. You were far better than that worthless cousin I'd asked. Thank the mercies he'd gotten himself too lushed at the pub to perform!"

"Er, yes..." Gregson cleared his throat. A very slight twinge of guilt timidly lifted its beaten head. Gregson beat it back to submission where it belonged. "Well. I'd be pleased if you let me return the favour, you know."

"Pardon?" Bradstreet gaped.

Gregson prayed for patience. "Lestrade's going to need some extra help in this. I wouldn't put those daft Cheathams to wage one more campaign of mischief."

Bradstreet grinned like a shark. "I get you." His sharkiness spread. "You'd just love to get your hands on someone tied to Quimper, wouldn't you?"

"You have to admit, some of those Cheathams are destined for prison. Just look at them."

"I don't have to. They're like walking boulders."

"So the first step is to make certain Lestrade doesn't get stuck in their craw."

"I've already thought of that." Bradstreet assured him.

"You have?" Gregson didn't bother to hide his surprise. He couldn't.

"Certainly. Now that they're officially engaged, he's expected to see her every day he can make it. And that means exchanging gifts." Bradstreet sipped his tea with aplomb while Gregson's finely developed eye for disaster grew sharper and sharper. "After work I'm taking him to the shops. He needs to pick something suitable for the lady."

"Oh. Ah. Yes." Gregson agreed faintly while distant (but not distant enough) memories of Bradstreet's courtship with Miss Hazel Roane swirled in his feverish brain.

"Bradstreet...you aren't going to suggest he buy her...a fish are you?"

"What, this time of year?" Bradstreet chuffed. "That'd be daft, wouldn't it?"

"Not nearly as daft as my coming along with you."

. . . . . . . . . . .

Getting Lestrade to the shops wasn't as hard as getting him out of his office. Between the two of them, they managed, but Gregson had to explain his presence all over again.

"Look, Roger was my best man, and I'm here to make certain he's just as good."

"I see." Lestrade said in scathing tones more loaded with suspicion than a nettle had stings. Gregson knew his rival didn't trust him for one minute. Which was natural-Gregson was lying about his reason for being there, but he doubted Lestrade would understand.

Bradstreet was salt of the earth, a real workman with unimpeachable honour and a devoted family man, provider, loving husband and a credit to the police.

The balance to all of this was the fact that most of the time, he was utter rubbish when it came to knowing what women (especially THE ONE) wanted. Fairly early into the marriage, Mrs. Bradstreet had simply provided her husband with a list to consult. Bradstreet had it memorized, and followed it as faithfully as a Bible...

...but...

Gregson knew full well women were different, and Clea Cheatham's tastes would not-could not possibly-mirror Hazel Bradstreet's in everything.

This might get bloody without proper intervention.

"Ready, gents?" Bradstreet beamed cheerfully, and took off into the street without waiting for a response.

Heaven have mercy.

. . . . . . . . . . .

The shop was the stuff of nightmares-if not the origin of deep and vague fears into men.

Well, men besides Bradstreet...Lestrade thought miserably. He'd never thought about what it must be like to be the doll in the doll-house, but being surrounded by scores upon scores of miniatures, collection-items, mementos, and confections of paper, paint, colour, tint, gilt, and flowers.

At least Gregson looked just as miserable, he comforted himself. The man clearly wanted another smoke, but in this shop that was open license to burn the shop to ash.

Bradstreet was well known. The puffy pink gentleman behind the desk and his young assistant inquired as to the health of his wife and daughter with considerable familiarity. Bradstreet answered in the same language.

Lestrade was just contemplating his odds of escaping (if he moved quickly enough, he could do it without Gregson; but if he moved too slowly, Gregson would block the entrance and trap him like a rat). Gregson's silent glare from the other side of a bowl of dyed ostrich plumes promised meaningful agony if he tried anything.

"Ah, here we are!" Bradstreet triumphantly produced a mechanical valentine from a shelf. "Try this little work of art!" he snapped the card open with a flourish.

Lestrade stared, dumbfounded. Unfolded, the pale pink paper accordioned out to a pedestal shape, ringed by cut and lithographed roses. The pedestal was the trunk of a bizarre sort of a set of scales-a scales crossed with a floral bower-only instead of weights resting in the swinging dishes, each dish held a barely-dressed and beaming rose-cheeked cupid with unnaturally curly locks.

The cupid on the left held a dove in a way no dove in Lestrade's experience would tolerate (you didn't manhandle the wings of anything if you didn't want to be pecked to death). The opposing cupid gleefully displayed a swollen red heart stabbed with a murderously sharp golden arrow.

Perched atop the trunk of the scales ws a third cupid, smirking unpleasantly as he poised an empty bow in a fat hand. Lithographed roses, ribbons, and swollen fruits decorated the atrocious display.

Lestrade caught himself. He was still staring, and it looked just as awful as it had thirty seconds ago.

"Well?" Bradstreet was waiting.

Lestrade struggled to think of a word-any word. At the same time, he wondered if it really was impossible to expire from horrification.

"The man's overcome with joy." Gregson smiled insufferably. His face was exactly the one the smug little archer-cupid was wearing.

"I'm overcome, yes..." Lestrade agreed faintly.

"Well?" Bradstreet persisted with just a bit more impatience.

"W-well...what?" Lestrade stammered.

"We've got a full shelf of these to choose from. Women like cards. What about this one?" Bradstreet just did not know how to drop a hopeless quest.

"_That_?"

"_YES_!"

It wasn't the first time Lestrade was rendered speechless by the unfathomable-or by Bradstreet-but it didn't get easier with practice.

"Oh, for..." Bradstreet sighed to the heavens, which was in this case, a richly moulded ceiling from which depended a collection of paper birds, butterflies, flowers, honey-bees embracing flowers, and one green dragon whom was (going by his sickly grin), suffering the effects of gorging on too many sweet young maids.

"Lestrade, old fellow..." Bradstreet took a deep breath. Had he or Lestrade truly known how much Gregson was enjoying life at this moment, the shop would have been sprayed down with his bright Norman blood. "Women like these little expressions of affection. It makes them feel appreciated."

Lestrade was still not trusting himself to speak. Bradstreet chose an optimistic outlook: He wasn't arguing.

Unbeknownst to Bradstreet, Lestrade was speechless anew at Bradstreet's last statement. Mrs. Bradstreet was a near-six foot, flame-haired Amazon. Her husband's choice of phrase, "makes them feel appreciated" had nearly blasted Lestrade's limited imagination to the Hottentots. How could anyone MAKE a woman like that feel appreciated? For that matter, how _couldn't _she appreciate herself?

Bradstreet gave up. He looked at Gregson. Gregson shrugged.

"What did you give your future missus during courtship?"

Gregson huffed. "Stationary."

"Stationary." Bradstreet repeated. Lestrade blinked. Even he hadn't expected that answer.

"Well, she can't talk, so she does go through a lot of paper." Gregson said a bit defensively. "And she's so choosy about her perfumes, there was no sense in flowers, or possets, or tussy-mussies, or fruits and sweets. And you know, it isn't easy getting ladyish stationary and envelopes because they always want to scent that."

"I see." Bradstreet railed bravely. "What did your father get your mum, Lestrade?"

Blank panic was on Lestrade's face.

"Well, what kind of thing does he get for her? Surely he gave her a token of affection once or twice."

Gregson thought 'surely' was an ambitiously sunny adverb when it came to all matters Lestradish, but in the hopes of an amusing answer, he kept mum.

Lestrade's brow broke into a sweat. "Spices."

"Eh?"

"She missed the things she ate back on the Continent, so he bought her what she missed."

"Spices?"

"Yes...what are you two staring at?"

Gregson and Bradstreet traded looks with each other. Once in a great while, Lestrade demonstrated the utter alienism of his upbringing. He clearly didn't know spices were an horrendously unsuitable gift for one's fiancee.

"Rule out spices." Gregson said firmly. "She's got her own kitchen, for Heaven's sake. You might insult her if you bought any additions."

Bradstreet wilted in silent relief. "It shouldn't be overdone, but there should be something."

Lestrade took a deep breath. He was stuck.

He wasn't an ignoramous over the rules of courtship. He knew he was expected to see his intended every evening until the wedding date, hell or high water (and both being likely in equal proportions).

However-and this was a real snorter-the sheer number of visits meant a great many gifts.

A great many.

Many.

Lots.

"Geoffrey?"

Many.

Lots.

SNAP!

Lestrade jumped, thrust back to the planet by Bradstreet's large fingers before his face.

"Your head was deep in a coal pit." Bradstreet accused. "Are you gunna be all right? you're looking pale."

"He's right." Gregson agreed rudely. "And when a Scot says you're pale, you're pale."

"HALF Scot, you bloody Norman!"

"No, it's 'Normans! Bloody!'"

Lestrade groaned. this wasn't going to work. He just knew it.


	2. Love is the Honey

**Love is the Honey**

**-Victor Hugo**

Lestrade's unease extended through the next quarter-hour. Throughout this time he managed to fend off more of Bradstreet's helpful (and not-as-helpful) suggestions in three different shops (confectionary's, flowers, bookseller specialising in poetry). It was easy to hold firm because Gregson was watching with all the concrete disapproval of the stone lion off the library steps.

Lestrade knew full well that was Gregson's favourite face when he was trying _not _to commit self-murder through stifled mirth. Just as a drunkard could accidentally expire on his own vomit, so Gregson might buy an early billet to the Ferryman's Final Pleasure Cruise by consciously choking on a Lestrade-inspired guffaw.

In the shrunken depths of his heart, Lestrade had a terrible feeling that he deserved every inch of Gregson's amusement.

**Banquo's Ghost Tavern:**

"Why are we _here_?" Bradstreet asked plaintively. "This is not our usual place for a pint, Gregson."

"Not even _occasional_." Lestrade agreed, his eyes jumping nervously from object to object in an establishment that was dark and murky as it was loud, smoky, and foul. "I don't believe I've ever been here."

"It's about time you were." Gregson pointed out as if that explained everything. "I know it looks a bit rough about the edges, but the food's decent and they brew their own winter warmers."1

Lestrade flinched as a patron let fly with a fistful of darts. Most of them struck the target on the opposing wall. "Brewed out of what?" He asked under his breath.

"Oh, come along, ladies."

Abashed, the other two followed in Gregson's wake. Bradstreet was able to keep mum until the tow-headed Yarder swept a corner clear with a large hand and an oath straight out of the Anglo-Saxon regime.

"And we are here...?" The Borderman ventured again. Lestrade thought this was really quite brave of him.

Gregson snorted. "We're going to muddle through this, that's why."

"In a tavern."

Lestrade was silent. He had decided not to talk. Talking might get him involved in something, and he didn't want to be involved in anything at this point.

"Just...go order us a few drinks. Three of the Special, no spices, only make sure we have _doubles_." Gregson tossed his money-purse down for Bradstreet's use.

Bradstreet scowled dubiously at the crowd. It and the tavern was of a rougher type than he liked. "Back in a few," he promised darkly, and turned his back, using his broad shoulders to force his way through the teeming mass of after-hours drinkers, smokers, and what appeared to be an entire corner devoted to the fine art of lying. Throughout it, people were lifting mochaware mugs of pints and pint-and-a-halfs of something that looked dark and syrupy, like very watery treacle.

Gregson caught his look. "Oh, come off it. Even you aren't so prissy that you haven't been catered in a clay establishment."

Lestrade grumbled. "I'm a cider drinker, Gregson. Of course I drink out of a clay vessel! But this is the sort of place the Office would send me when they needed the CID _in mufti_."

"Don't try to talk Latin like you know what it means."

"Two bloody words, you smug yellow gorilla. And I know bloody well what it means. It means out of twig and should we be using easily understood English here?"

"Question #3 on the Policeman's exam, was it?" Gregson smirked.

Feeling more desperate than ever, Lestrade frowned at the table, touched it to check the cleanliness, and gave up.

"Nice bit of guilt you held back, back there." he glared at Gregson. "How long's it going to be before _he -" (meaning Bradstreet) "-_finds out you _'just happened'_ to be available as best man when his precious cousin vanished into a tavern?"

"Oh, about the same time he puts two and two together, and realises there's something awfully familiar about _'that little Tinker'_ who drank his wretched cousin under the table, thus rendering him unfit for his wedding duties." Gregson's smirk grew to more natural proportions.

Lestrade's scowl only grew with age. "Just trying to keep the soak from following up on his plans to put our man in the surgery of Bart's." he grumbled. "Where _does _Roger pick 'em anyway?"

"He was trying to be on good terms with what relatives he had left, you daft water-rat. When you're too worried about that, you're not gunna think about silly things like how your marriage to the prettiest girl in the Borders plus the Outer Isles is gunna clean the clock of half the men for miles around." Gregson leaned back with a slight smirk (his usual expression).

Lestrade mumbled something and actually wished for that pint to appear, right at that moment.

Unfortunately, Bradstreet did.

"For the gents!" Three heavy mochaware mugs (and all three bearing the seal proclaiming it _exactly _the legal quart-measurement of drink for Britain), slammed down on the plank, dislodging greasy dust-balls. Pleased with himself, Bradstreet returned Gregson's limp purse and settled back, wrapping his hands around his own quart.

"Those did not cost a damned shilling!" Gregson yelped.

Bradstreet grinned through his teeth. "Yes they did."

"The hell they did!"

"Three quarts in quart mugs."

"You-you bought the mugs too?" Gregson gasped.

Lestrade's own mug hung suspended from the yardarm of his arm, his mouth hanging open. His eyes were frogged open at the sight of Bradstreet going up against Gregson.

"You didn't say not to." Bradstreet answered sweetly.

Gregson began to sputter. Lestrade really did want to enjoy this sight, but he knew better.

Bradstreet, immune to danger as much as he was to the social niceties, drank deep and sighed, wiping a pale foam from his moustaches. "Not bad." He decided. "Try it, Lestrade. It's not half bad."

Lestrade didn't think it was half good either, but he took a drink and set the mug down, mentally calating the required hours he would need to drink this before dying.

"Well?" Bradstreet wondered.

Gregson stopped sputtering long enough to add his challenging stare.

"Not bad." Lestrade managed to say. Privately, he was thinking that rye bread should be eaten with a knife and a slab of butter-not drunk. "What is this?"

"The special. He said so."

"I know that, Roger...what's the name?" He needed to know for future reference...if not avoidance.

"It's a version of the old classic." Gregson settled back contentedly, his quart resting in a hand nearly as large. "House version of Theakston's Old Peculier."

"Oh."

Gregson correctly interpreted Lestrade's expression. "It doesn't mean that," he snapped. "It comes from the Peculier Church. You know-the churches that answered to the monarchy and not the bishops?"

"Oh. Yes. Got it."

Gregson groaned. "All right. We are gathered here today because Bradstreet and I know Lestrade's odds of proper courtship of Miss Cheatham are utter rubbish."

Bradstreet grabbed Lestrade and held him tight, but the ruckus brought in the attention of the Liar's Table in the opposing corner but the darts-board.

"Get just a little closer, Gregson!" Lestrade dared.

"Lestrade this isn't about you." Gregson snapped. "It's about the fact that the Cheathams are just waiting for an excuse to make Miss Cheatham cry off. Now even with Bradstreet's sterling assistance (not to mention his great experience with wooing), you're going to have to be careful because I for one do not want to take up the remains of your Case of the Horseshoes if the Cheathams put you in St. Mary's Marble Orchard."

"If that's the best you can alliterate, Lord Byron need never fear." Bradstreet shot back snidely.

Lestrade was taking deep breaths. That seemed to help...either that or the foul weed being smoked in the tavern was diluting the blood going to his brain.

"So here's what you're up against." Gregson leaned forward with his hands wrapped around his quart of Peculier Rye Winter. "You've got enough money on a policeman's salary that you don't have to worry about courting on oh, say, a ditch-digger's salary. Your cash bonuses more than make up for that discrepancy in pay." He took a healthy gulp of the brew and set the vessel back down. "The Cheathams are accustomed to the face of accoutrements and money, even though they still have that rising class attitude."

"Gregson," Lestrade said wearily, "People are _supposed _to rise above their station."

"Very true, but some people forget that little point. You've got a prospective father in law who was in prison once already for criminally throwing a fight-"

"He didn't throw a fight, he just let himself get battered into porridge by the other wrestler." Bradstreet corrected.

"The point is," Gregson hissed, "All six of his sons have the chance of following in his footsteps, and they're just itching for you to make a mess of things again, Lestrade."

"Again?" Lestrade yelped.

Bradstreet groaned, hoping the conversation wouldn't head down this path. Again.

"If anything happens to you, Quimper will be laughing his poncey arse off. Don't even tell me they think his ship went down in the channel. He can still laugh on this side of Davy's Locker."

Lestrade snorted, but didn't argue.

Bradstreet hoped Gregson never caught on that Lestrade wasn't agreeing to his superior view with his silence-it just meant Lestrade didn't believe in wasting his breath on dead embers.

"All right." Gregson nodded. "You're expected to visit your fiancee every evening you're free. If not, at least make certain your thoughtful token of affection gets to her. Your problem is you're about as cultivated as a clump of sea kale."

"Someday, Gregson, you're going to stop trying to protect my feelings. And then I'll just keel over dead."

Gregson paused for just a moment, before recognising the sarcasm. He tutted and kept going.

"You can't give them any opportunity to take you personal enough that they won't try to thrash you again." He explained with what he thought was a great deal of patience. And as far as Lestrade was concerned, it was. "The usual tokens are small and tasteful-we know Bradstreet has mastered the art of making his wife happy-"

-and if that wasn't an example of Lying for the Higher Cause, Lestrade didn't know what it was. From the pinched look about Gregson's mouth, he was thinking the same thing. "So you need to think of what you're going to do to impress her, yet at the same time, avoid even the faintest of insults."

"Oh, God." Lestrade drank his quart down without thinking. He didn't want to think. That was _why _he drank the fermented rye bread in a clay mug.

"Bloody hell, why did you do that?" Gregson exclaimed. "Now I have to order more!"

"What? No! NO." Lestrade waved his hands wildly. "No, you don't! Really! It's fine! I've had enough!"

"It's the house rules, you walking brewery! That's why I ordered the large! Those things can take all day to finish!"

Struck dumb, Lestrade and Bradstreet watched as Gregson rose to his feet with the empty mug, puffing and muttering and steaming like a train's boiler the whole time.

They were left alone.

"You know," Bradstreet said slowly, "You have to wonder about the legality of this place."

"It lets Gregson in. How respectable can that be?" Lestrade shot back. His head was swmining. Finding a gutter might be a good idea. "Banquo's Ghost. How the bloody hell do these taverns come up with these names?"

"I asked that of the waiter." Bradstreet told him. "More politely than that, of course."

"I'm not that interested, Bradstreet."

"According to him, they named it after a ghost in literature so people wouldn't think about the real ghost haunting the downstairs cellar."

"What addled reasoning is behind that?" Lestrade lifted his head long enough to gape.

Bradstreet lifted his shoulders and took a sip of the brew. It really was thick. Thicker than liquid refreshment was meant to be. "You have to admit, it's more poetic than going to the Bucket of Blood over at Phillack."

"Like I would be caught dead over there."

"You wouldn't be the only one. Not with a name like that."

Lestrade groaned and put his head into his arms. "You bleedin' traitor, siding with Gregson."

"I never said I was." Bradstreet protested.

"Oh, you aren't siding with him?" Lestrade sniffed. "Like I believe that."

"You know damn well I'm a poor liar. But you also know its best to go along with what he says we should be doing."

"Man doesn't have a hobby." Lestrade said into his hands. "Torturing fellow men of the badge is not a hobby."

"Oh, he might have a better way of whittling 'way his time before too much longer." Bradstreet smiled dryly.

"Hmph."

"No, really."

"Eh?" Lestrade opened a heavily jaded eye. "What do you mean?"

"I mean his precious pub is about to get inspected by the Crown." Bradstreet smiled sweetly. At Lestrade's foggy stare of incomprehension, the Runner lifted his mug to Lestrade's face. "You'll notice," he said very quietly, below the level of rousing nonsense about the tavern, "That the quart line and the top of the brew doesn't quite match up."

Lestrade nearly stared himself cross-eyed at the mug. It was a quite ordinary mochaware, of white stripes across a sky-blue mug (that is, if the sky would ever be blue in London). The Imperial Weights and Measures stamp rested on the side, proclaiming its legal measurement of one British quart of liquid.

As Bradstreet said, there was a bit of a discrepancy between the painted fill line and what his eye told him a quart should look like.

"Is that why they have the rule that you have to drink it up?" He stammered.

"Not a bad way to make the public complicit." Bradstreet's smile remained sweet. "And you know Gregson. He's sharp as mustard...but weights and measures aren't his strength."

"Are you going to lead the raid?" Lestrade asked hopefully.

"Of course not. I'm turning in the mugs as evidence. It's enough that his money paid for 'em." Bradstreet took another, happier sigh. "Here he comes. Now pipe down, look sharp, and let's just do what he says until we can get out of here."

1Winter Warmers: a 6%-10% winter-brewed Strong ale.


End file.
